


I knew her once

by MartinusMiraculorum



Category: Carmilla (Web Series)
Genre: F/F, Gen, Post-Season Two (Carmilla), at one point this was a Winter Soldier AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-01-17
Updated: 2016-01-22
Packaged: 2018-05-14 14:07:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,284
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5747311
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MartinusMiraculorum/pseuds/MartinusMiraculorum
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Laura fled into the bowels of the Library, she had no idea what she had left behind.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Old Friends

**Chapter One: Old Friends**

As Laura leans over a dusty tome (there really is no other word for it), shining the keychain flashlight over the faded words, a part of her reflects on how she really is getting into the whole ‘girl detective’ thing.

Of course, if she had the option, she wouldn’t be in what remains of the campus library after a series of strange shifts of reality that none of them could really explain. But the depressing truth is that almost nowhere is safe at this point. Not with the Dean’s plans having come to fruition in the worst way. Silas University is rapidly losing any pretense of being a higher education establishment, and daily falls into a camp for unfortunate college students surrounded by God-only-knew what kind of evil.

They certainly couldn’t stay in the Dean’s _house_.

Laura sighs as she reaches the end of yet another dull chapter that offers little to no information about finding a way to thwart the Dean’s plan to open the Gate and unleash what honestly sounds like a genuine Buffy-style hellmouth on the sleepy country of Styria. _Maybe that’s why she’s keeping the students around,_ Laura muses. _Demon food._

It’s a chilling thought. That it only slots it around number seven on her list of pressing concerns speaks loudly about the gravity of the situation she now finds herself in.

She could run. She could take Carmilla and LaF and run. Leave everyone and everything behind, again. The woods beyond the campus boundary were dangerous, Carmilla reported, but passable.

No. She wouldn’t… _Danny_ had stayed, last time, and it was a credit to how good a person she had been that she never once rubbed Laura’s face in it, called her or Carmilla or LaF or Perry cowards.

LaFontaine is somewhere else, she knows, doing their own research. They haven’t said, but Laura suspects they are trying to find a way to track down Perry.

Kirsch is missing too. It’s been almost three weeks since they've seen him.

Laura rubs a hand over her face, trying not to let her frustration boil over.

She hears a creak of floorboards somewhere in the distance, and freezes. It could easily be LaF or even Carmilla, who has agreed to act as lookout in case they need to vanish from the main floors back into the endless series of tunnels that have increasingly become their home.

She considers calling out; thinks better of it. Tries to listen to figure out where it is coming from. LaFontaine has long since disappeared from view, and she can’t see any trace of their flashlight. The winds blow harder outside, sending more creaks through the building.

Then she hears it – footsteps.

‘Carm?’ she tries. No reply, but the footsteps get closer. _Okay_ , she thinks, _this is definitely not good._

She looks back, and feels a shiver run through her at the sight of a tall figure in the doorway. It moves towards her, slowly, then stops, slinking to the side. Another figure comes up behind it, framing itself in the doorway. Laura shifts her flashlight, and feels her heart stop.

‘ _Perry?’_ she asks, but even as the name leaves her mouth, she knows it isn’t her old floor don. It _looks_ like her, certainly, but the kind of refined malice that even now radiates from Laura’s former floor don is…alien. Wrong. _Not_ Perry.

Perry holds a finger to her lips, smiling in a way that twists Laura’s stomach. “Shh, Laura dear. We mustn’t make so much noise.”

Laura shakes her head, eyeing the tall form still engulfed in shadow, but making no move to approach her. “You aren’t Perry. What have you done with her?”

“Clever girl,” not-Perry replies, but there is biting sarcasm in her tone. “And here I thought you’d be happy to see me.”

Laura glances behind her, towards the direction LaFontaine took, and regrets it. _Damn it, now they know I’m not alone_.

Her eyes are drawn again to the silhouette of not-Perry’s silent bodyguard. There is something familiar about it. Some kind of monster she’d read about? It was probably a vampire, she supposes, but something niggles at her mind. Why was it staying there, deliberately hidden from her sight? Why wasn’t… _whatever_ Perry was - and Laura had a sinking suspicion she knew - using her guard to further intimate Laura, trap her, capture her. Despite everything that had happened between them, she knew instinctively that Carmilla would come for her if she was in danger. It was the same way she’d known that Danny would do the same. At least, before…

 _No_. She would not think about that, not right now.

“Don’t worry, Laura, we know about your friend,” Not-Perry says dismissively, waving a hand. “We’ll move onto her when this business is concluded.” Now she places her hands on her hips in a gesture of exasperation. “Really, you have made it all too easy to finally clean up this mess.”

“ _Them,_ ” Laura mutters under her breath. Somehow correct pronouns feel important right now, even though she knows she may be very well about to die. “You’re the Dean. You…you’re controlling Perry.”

Not-Perry smiles, her lips pulling up in a way that is almost grotesque, and claps her hands. “Oh well done, Laura. I suppose I should have expected Mircalla wouldn’t fall for some air-headed imbecile. Now then, this is quite fun, but really, your little rebellion has gone on long enough.” She glances to the side. “It’s time to say hello…and goodbye, I suppose.”

The shadow at her side begins stalking forward, and in a panic Laura jerks her hand to illuminate the oncoming threat.

She almost wishes she hadn’t.

 _It’s not possible,_ she tells herself. _It’s a trick. She’s…no, I_ saw _her…_

And just a fraction of a second later, she’s being held off the ground, an iron grip around her throat, short legs kicking uselessly at the air.

 _Danny_.

She wonders if it’s a hallucination caused by a lack of oxygen and a guilty conscience. But there is something far too viscerally real about the familiar features in front on her, though she is deathly pallid, her red hair hanging limply over her shoulders, her eyes – those beautiful blue eyes – filled with a malevolence so visceral and raw it shakes Laura to her very core. Splashes of what she knows to be half-dried blood dot her face and clothing, her teeth shining red.

Suddenly Laura is flying across the room an instant before she slams into a row of bookshelves with crushing force, driving the wind out of her and sending flares of agony up and down her back. She crumples to the ground, gasping, willing it all to be a bad dream, to open her eyes to feel Carmilla shaking her shoulders, heartbreaking concern in those ancient eyes.

It’s not a dream. Or at least, it’s not a nightmare she may ever wake from.

“Danny,” she gasps as the tall figure stalks towards her.

The spectre freezes, staring. “Who the hell is Danny?” she demands.

“It’s you,” Laura croaks desperately. “You’re Danny. You don’t want to do this!”

Danny – or something that can’t be Danny, because Danny would never do this, would never live like this, would _never_ hurt her – starts towards her again, and as she tries to scramble away, a powerful blow to the side of her head sets her ears ringing. Then the cold fingers close around her throat again, and she’s raised into the air, so that she stares down at the monster that had been her friend and just over her shoulder can see the Dean, looking nothing short of gleeful.

Laura’s vision begins to go black at the edges, her lungs screaming for oxygen, her feet flailing uselessly, her hands clawing at Danny’s to no avail.

And then she’s falling again, and a black streak has knocked the thing-that-was-Danny sprawling, and she lands on her back hard and greedily sucks down air before rolling over to see the-thing-that-was-Danny locked in combat with an unmistakably familiar black panther. But before Laura can feel any relief, the-thing-that-was-Danny has driven an uppercut right into Carm’s throat, and the panther goes limp, and she’s shifting back into a human form just as the-thing-that-was-Danny pulls her to her feet by the neck, duplicating Laura’s plight seconds before and, she thinks in horrified wonderment, the mirror image of a scene in her old dorm room when Danny had let her protective instincts get the better of her and Carmilla had nearly made her pay.

Still dazed, dimly aware she’s probably concussed, Laura flails around for something, _anything_ that might allow her to fight back. Her hand closes on a brick, one of dozens littering the ground after the recent upheavals. She staggers to her feet, the world spinning around her, and stumbles forward, bringing her arm forward with all her strength.

She’s too short to hit Danny in the head. As it is, her blow lands heavily near the-thing-that-was-Danny’s tensed shoulders. It’s _just_ enough for Carmilla to recover, and her feet swing forward to catch the-thing-that-was-Danny in the gut and knock her back violently into the wall.

Then there’s a blinding flash, a small explosion, and Laura shuts her eyes tight, the afterimages burning brightly. It takes a second for her to realize what it was.

_Flashbomb._

_LaFontaine_.

She’s struggling to get to her feet as Carmilla, now shifted back into a panther, lunges at Danny and catches her around the middle, driving her back. Her jaws snap at Danny’s throat, and Laura nearly screams. “ _Carm_ …” she whimpers.

The vampire must have heard her, somehow, because instead of ripping the-thing-that-was-Danny’s throat out, her jaws snap around Danny’s right bicep, and a piercing scream erupts from the-thing-that-was-Danny. Carmilla strikes out again, claws slashing across the-thing-that-was-Danny’s torso, and then pulls back. She’s human again. Well, human shaped. Somehow Laura never actually sees the intermediate stage she must surely pass through. There’s also the matter of how her clothes survive the transformation. She always meant to ask about that.

“ _RUN!”_ Carmilla screams, and dimly she feels her feet begin to move, heading towards the source of the flashbomb. She looks back over her shoulder to see the-thing-that-was-Danny getting to her feet, lit by the flickering light of residual sparks, blood drenching her shirt, a look of pure murder in her eyes.

Then she’s stumbling forward, feet skidding on the ground as Carmilla bodily drags her out of the room. As soon as they are clear, LaF pushes an ancient wooden bookcase over. It shakes the room as it crashes down, almost completely blocking the door.

“That won’t hold them long,” LaFontaine pants. “Come on, the exit’s just this way. Laura, _come on!_ ”

“ _Right_ ,” she almost whispers. “ _Running now_.”

As they vanish into the tunnels, followed by the sounds of something tearing through their temporary barricade, all Laura can see are those hate filled eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I watched Carmilla S2 -finally- and this happened. I love everyone, I do, but a tremendous degree of my investment in the show is bound up in Danny Lawrence. Which is exactly why I am so excited to see what they do with her now that she's literally the thing she hates, because I love some good angst. 
> 
> There's one more chapter of this written, and ideally this will be a longer story, but as you can probably tell from my profile, I start many things and sort of drop the ball. I swear that once I wrote 100,000 word Harry Potter fic. Really. 
> 
> I always feel weird about using the present tense, but I started here and it just felt right. Laura's a very present tense kind of person, if you know what I mean. Very very impulsive and in-the-moment. I may play around with other tenses if I do other POVs, as such words do not describe LaF or Carmilla herself.


	2. Resolutions

**Chapter Two: Resolutions**

 

“Come on, Creampuff, I need you here, with me, right now.”

Laura is dimly aware of Carmilla’s hand passing before her glazed eyes, but it feels like she is in a dream. Reality has bent and broken and Danny…

Danny is a _vampire_.

“Laura, please, talk to me,” Carmilla’s voice is softer now, almost gentle.

 _Danny_ is a _VAMPIRE._

“How did it happen, Carm?”

Carmilla grimaces, and opens her mouth to answer.

“How did _what_ happen?” LaFontaine demands. They have (probably correctly) assumed that Laura and Carmilla had forgotten they were still there. And she owes LaF an answer. _Did they not see Perry after all?_   She supposes their dark vision was probably ruined by the Flashbomb (it was very difficult to know _when_ the little gifts of the Alchemy Club would actually go off) and Not-Perry had seemed to retreat into the shadows as soon as Carmilla got involved.

“I take it you didn’t see anything,” Carmilla says, still staring at Laura.

LaFontaine is impatient now, and angry. “No, I didn’t see a damn thing.”

Laura looks at them. “Perry’s the Dean. Danny’s a vampire.” Her voice is flat and lifeless.

Silence. _I wouldn’t believe it either_ , she muses. It sounds too horrible to possibly be true.

“Not funny,” they say at last. Laura sees something die in their eyes as they continue, “you’re not joking, are you? Please tell me you are joking. I’ll forgive you for the horrible timing and pass it off as PTSD.”

Laura winces as she feels the bruises around her neck, the side of her temple (her ears are still ringing, adding to the surreal atmosphere), up and down her back. She’s going to be scarcely able to move when it all hits her.

“I’m…I’m sorry, LaF. I don’t…I don’t know what happened, and we _will_ find out!” she vows, then groans in pain as even raising her voice sends spasms of agony through her body. Carmilla finally seems to notice her injuries.

“Let’s get you lying down, Laura,” she says. Laura notices that Carm’s got a nasty black eye forming. Or what she assumes is a black eye, she’s never sure how that works without a full blood supply. And she’s probably hurting from the beating the-thing-that-was-Danny had given her. There’s also traces of blood around her mouth. Laura _really_ tries not to think about that.

She nearly screams as Carmilla effortlessly lifts her out of her chair, and carries her over to one of the ratty discarded mattresses they’ve been sleeping on for a week and a half. LaFontaine seems to snap out of their reverie and move to help, grabbing the first aid kit as they come over.

Laura shuts her eyes as the uneven mattress pushes at her sore back, then finds a position that isn’t exactly comfortable but doesn’t make her want to scream. “Carm, do you know how this happened?” she asks quietly, a part of her afraid to know the answer.

Carmilla sighs, sitting back on her heels on the filthy packed earth that counts as a floor. “Mother has always had the ability for possession, as long as I’ve know her, at least. You remember she possessed you with that amulet, right?”

Laura nods. Her world swims. _Concussion, yup._

“Well, I guess that was an easier version of that. I’ve…I’ve suspected for a long time that the body she had wasn’t actually her first. She really stood out in Styria, looked more western European than Eastern, but she said she grew up in the area. I mean, she’s thousands of years old, so that could mean a lot of things.”

“But you think this has happened before?” LaF asks hesistantly.

Carmilla nods. “And before you ask, no, I don’t know how to get her out without killing the host.”

“We are _not_ killing Perry,” LaFontaine says, and there is steel in their voice.

“No plans to do that,” Carmilla says, glancing back at Laura. “As for Xena…”

“Wait, so that part _was_ real?” LaF asks. “Look, as I reflect back on it, there were a lot of moments where Perr wasn’t acting like herself. I passed it off as stress, you know, we didn’t see as much of each other with all the weird happening. But Danny. I saw her dead.”

“She died in my arms,” Laura whispers, tears threatening to spill over. “She died in my arms and there wasn’t a damn thing I could do.”

“Right,” LaF says, looking warily at Laura, as if afraid to continue. “So how does she end up all fang-like?”

“There are…ways,” Carmilla says after a pause. “Ways of resurrecting, well, thralls from the deceased. It’s a kind of blood magic, not vampirism, exactly.”

“Thralls?” Laura says quietly. “So Danny’s gone? It’s just a _thing_ wearing her body?” The thought turned her stomach.

Carmilla looked pained. “I don’t know,” she admitted. “That seems to be the case a lot of the time, but usually that’s with very, _very_ dead people. Somebody who had died just hours ago…maybe more survives. She’s not herself though.”

“ _Obviously_ ,” Laura whispers under her breath. Danny would never hurt her. Never throw her around like a rag doll.

_Who the hell is Danny?_

“She doesn’t know her own name,” Laura adds. “I called her Danny, and she didn’t recognize it.”

Carmilla frowns. “That’s not good.”

Laura tries to sit up, regrets it immediately. “What do you _mean_?” she demands. A part of her, a small part, had hoped that Danny was like Carmilla, that she could be brought back over to the good side, that she didn’t _have_ to be a monster. Having that fantasy shattered feels like losing Danny all over again.

Laura’s not sure if she can take it.

Carmilla holds up her hands defensively as LaF gently pushes Laura back onto the bed, and begins looking over her injuries. They hold up Laura’s keychain flashlight. “Follow this, Laura.”

She tries, but from the look on LaF’s face, she wasn’t terribly successful. “Concussion, I think,” LaF pronounces. “You’re not moving for a while.”

“I don’t think I _could_ ,” Laura points out. Then she looks at Carmilla again, who looks lost in thought. “What did you mean by 'that's not good'?”

Carmilla sighs. “Laura, when I first woke up, after I died, I mean, I didn’t remember who I was either. I didn’t know where I was, how I’d gotten there, and who Mother was.” She pauses. “It took a few hours for it all to come back. It’s been _three weeks_ since Xena died, Laura. That’s a long time to go not recognizing your own name...or your friends when you are trying to kill them.”

 _Don’t cry. Don’t cry. Don’t you_ dare _cry, Laura Hollis._

“We have to try,” she says. “I won’t give up on her.” Her voice is breaking. “I _won’t_ lose her again.”

Carmilla closes her eyes. “Laura…”

“ _NO!_ ” Laura burst out, sitting up despite the eye-watering, blistering pain. “I am _not_ giving up on her, Carm. She…she wouldn’t. She never ever would.”

Carmilla looks at her with something approaching pity. It’s one of the worst things Laura has ever felt. “Yeah, you’re right, she wouldn’t.”

LaFontaine looks back and forth between them, hesitating to interrupt their…moment? It doesn’t really feel like one. More Carmilla willing Laura to give up her insane fantasy of saving Danny before her heart is crushed again, maybe for good.

“Okay, so. We’re not killing Perry. We’re not killing Danny the Vampire.” They grimace as the words leave their mouth.

“You didn’t kill her,” Laura whispers at Carmilla, remembering. “You could have, you had her, but you went for the shoulder, not the throat. You heard me.”

Carmilla opens her mouth. “Well, she _is_ already dead…” She broke off at Laura’s Look. “Yeah. I heard you. And I guess…I couldn’t do it. It made me think of her as a person, again.” There was something in Carmilla’s tone Laura didn’t like. Something that said _that was a mistake_.

God but her life had turned into such a _mess_.

What was Danny to her, anyway. A friend? A missed opportunity? An old crush? Something else entirely?

She _couldn’t_ let her go. She…she realizes with a start that she might truly, genuinely, die first. _Because that’s what Danny would do._

 _That’s what she_ did.

Laura lies back, and the tears finally come. Carmilla looks awkward for a moment, then sits down and reaches out to take her hand. Laf gently runs their fingers though her hair, as her vision blurs and darkness settles over them all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My own writing nearly made me cry on this one, so go me. 
> 
> Poor Laura. She didn't deserve to be at the center of my angsty think piece. 
> 
> So yes, feelings are confused. I thought one thing Season 2 did well (and really, besides inexplicably side-lining LaFontaine for large chunks, I think the writers did a decent job integrating some desperately needed diversity into a mostly white cast and telling new stories) was shine the spotlight on the serious problem with Laura and Carmilla's relationship - that Laura sorts things into categories, namely, monsters and people. Carmilla confused that dichotomy, but Laura tried to believe that she had in fact crossed it and become a good 'person' to stay. It's the same reason she trusted Vordenburg - she wanted to believe there was an authority figure on the 'person' side of the spectrum. She paid for that.
> 
> Point being, Laura and Carmilla may or may not work things out eventually, but between those insecurities, Laura's tremendous betrayal of Carmilla's trust leading to Mattie's apparent demise, and Carmilla's past and essential nature, that time sure isn't right now. 
> 
> And shoot me, I have a thing for Hollence that during the back-half of Season Two came lurching back to life like Danny in the finale and viciously ate my feelings.


	3. Risk

** Chapter 3: Risk **

“You realize this is an absolutely terrible idea, right?” LaFontaine asks as they crawl on all fours behind Laura.

Laura stops and closes her eyes. “Yes, I do. As I’ve said the other ten times you’ve asked.”

“It’s not as though Geek Squad is wrong, you realize,” Carmilla adds from in front of her. “I think I’ve registered my objections to _literally crawling back into Mother’s house_.”

“Yes, yes you have,” Laura says for what feels like the millionth time in the last hour. “But we know we’ve got some key research on my computer, and who knows, I never turned off the video recorder, so it may have caught something after we left.” She pauses. “It’s worth the risk.” She has to keep telling herself that, in part because her body still aches all over and this is _not_ helping in the least.

“If you say so, Cupcake.” Carmilla turns back around. It occurs to Laura that the sight of the vampire’s leather-clad ass might be extremely exciting if she wasn’t completely terrified that she was leading them all to certain doom.

_Pants-wetting fear is one hell of a mood killer._

“I’m just saying, Laura,” LaF continues, “If we get caught and brutally tortured to death, this is all your fault.”

“Well, we’ll be dead anyway, so that will hardly matter.”

“I _will_ haunt you,” LaF vows, and Laura honestly believes it at that moment.

“It’s the middle of the day – we saw the Dean go into her office. Odds are very, _very_ good no one will be at home. Besides, we _can_ defend ourselves, right?”

Laura doesn’t need to see Carmilla’s face to know exactly what expression she’s wearing right now.

 _And with my luck, Danny,_ no _\- the thing-that-was-Danny - will be waiting for us when we pop the floorboards_.

It is…a hard distinction to make, especially as Laura, no matter how much Carmilla tries to dissuade her, refuses to give up on the idea that _Danny_ \- brave, compassionate, _good_ Danny - is still in there somewhere. _If Carmilla can turn good – well, less evil – after hundreds of years, Danny can do it too. I know it._

She _has_ to believe it. Because if she doesn’t her world might very well come crashing down in a way that simply could not be fixed.

She hasn’t talked about that yet. She tries her best not to think about it.

“We should cut down on the noise now,” Carmilla advises. “We’re getting closer.”

Laura nods, even though it occurs to her no one could actually see it.

They continue on, for what feels like an eternity, probably because unlike the time they had fled into the passages that seemed to run under the whole school, this time they have to stay quiet. Just in case there _is_ somebody there. LaF has a bag of stakes, and Laura has one tucked into her belt. Carmilla…doesn’t really need weapons.

Still, the only chance they have to take down any guards will be lost with the element of surprise. So they move on in silence, the only sound that of knees and hands scraping on dirt.

Carmilla waves them to a stop a few minutes later, and slowly creeps towards a gap in the floorboards where some dim light shines through from above. After a moment, she lifts it up, inch by inch, while Laura and LaF wait helplessly in the dark. Finally, the vampire either decides no one is there or gives up on secrecy, and flings the floorboard aside, momentarily blinding Laura.

“Come on out, we’re alone.”

“How can you possibly know that?” LaF demands.

Carmilla looks down at them. “I have very good hearing. There’s nobody here.”

That is good enough for Laura, who allows herself to be pulled out by Carmilla. LaF, more reluctantly, follows her.

Laura looks around, wondering how this room could seem so familiar and yet so alien at the same time.

“Let’s get your computer packed up and ready to go,” LaFontaine suggests, looking around nervously. “Forget the speakers, just the laptop and backup hard drive.”

Laura begins detaching cables.

“I was wrong,” Carmilla says, and her voice cuts through everything. “There’s someone here. I can smell…I can smell blood.”

That sends a shiver down Laura’s spine. “Where are they?” she whispers urgently.

Carmilla doesn’t answer, and instead slinks toward the door opposite the computer desk, and through it. LaF is piling a collection of old books and research notes into a bag. Laura resumes her own task. _Let Carmilla handle this. If she can’t, we’re all dead anyway._

“Well I’ll be damned,” Carmilla’s voice comes from the other room. “Come on, beefcake, I’ve got you,” she says, still out of Laura’s sight. A few moments later, Laura’s eyes are met by the bizarre sight of Carmilla holding up a much bigger human being.

“ _Kirsch!_ ” Laura cries, even as LaF slaps a hand over her mouth.

The former Zeta lifts his head weakly. “Hey, hot…Laura.” There’s something wrong with him. He’s deathly pale, and sweating, and his entire neck looks to be covered in…

“Bite marks,” LaF finishes the thought.

Carmilla nods. “Looks like you were the newbie’s blood bag, Kirsch. Lucky you.”

Laura is about to ask what the hell she is talking about, but Kirsch is mumbling. “Lawrence…”

“We know, Kirsch,” LaF says soberly.

“Is…is she the one that did this to you?” Laura asks, a cold lump forming in her stomach.

Kirsch just stares back at her, and then his eyes close and he goes limp. “Still alive,” Carmilla says immediately. “He needs blood. A lot of it, by the looks of things.”

Laura hesitates, but she has to know. “Carm, what did you mean by ‘blood bag?’”

“New vampires…well, they aren’t really ready for action immediately. They tire fast – the whole undead thing is rough on the body.” Carmilla pauses, looking _very_ uncomfortable. “Mother always gets her new…children a human to, well, drain, until they get their strength up. Usually it kills them. I guess the bro here is made of stronger stuff.”

Laura blurts out, “Did you have one?”

The look on Carmilla’s face says it all. “Do you really want the answer to that question, Laura?”

She shakes her head.

“Good, because it’s not something I care to revisit. Have you got that stuff together yet?”

“Almost,” LaF grunts as they crouch under the desk, retrieving a pair of flash drives they had left taped to the underside. “Laura, get the laptop itself, okay? I’ll take the rest.”

“Yeah, sure,” Laura replies. She shivers, and gets back to work.

“Are we taking him?” Carmilla asks suddenly.

Laura turns around slowly. “Of _course_ we are.”

“He’s going to be hard to get through the tunnels, and like I said, if we don’t get him blood really soon he isn’t going to make it.”

Laura says nothing.

“I _just_ wanted to make sure you understood, okay? I know you don’t want to lose anyone else.”

“I wonder what happened to J.P.,” LaF muses as they zip up the duffel containing most of their research for the past year. “He was a vampire, after all. Well, after he took Will’s body, at least.”

“I genuinely don’t know,” Carmilla says. “Mother appreciates loyalty, but, well,” she shrugs her shoulders, “sometimes she’s willing to allow a limited degree of rebellion.”

LaF does not look reassured. “Let’s get going,” they say, gesturing to the entrance of the passage. “Carmilla, you and Kirsch first. I’ll go next, Laura, you bring up the rear, and…”

They trail off at the sound of the front door swinging open violently.

“ _Fuck_ ,” Carmilla swears, and with a glance at Laura, then Kirsch, then Laura again, pulls the unconscious boy into the tunnel. LaF quickly hurries to follow, and Laura is right behind her. She _just_ hears the sound of approaching footsteps before she’s into the passage and pulling the floorboard back into place above them.

She knows she almost certainly imagined it, but she could have sworn for an instant she saw a fiery orange flash of an unmistakably familiar shade.

Fear drives her onward, and she banishes the thought from her mind. They have a long crawl and walk back to their library base ahead of them.

 

_______________

 

The Dean entered her study slowly, and one glance told her that she has had visitors. The girl’s computer and a collection of books, some of them of very, _very_ great antiquity (she _shudders_ to think of what those children have done to them) have all gone. Furthermore, her newest pet was standing stock still a few meters ahead, staring down at the hidden entrance to the maze of underground tunnels.

She sighed, chastising herself for not sealing them off. But she had so much to _do_ these last few weeks and sometimes things like that just slipped your mind. There was the corporation to move in, cleaning up the mess of Vordenberg’s silly revolt, dispensing justice, and a whole load of important rituals. Oh, and the curriculum needed to be redesigned as well. Plus the defenses around the school to make sure her students would not be running off in the night. Their presence…well, _temporary_ presence, was very much required.

 _It’s a good thing that most ritual sacrifices don’t_ actually _require virgins, or we’d be in trouble._

“What is it, then?” she snapped at her newest ‘child.’ And quite the handful she was. Once trained and experienced, she would be a tremendous asset. But that was the _trouble_ with post-mortem resurrections – you never quite knew what you would get.

“There was a girl,” she said softly, almost reverently, in a way that rather puzzled the Dean. “I…I knew her once. I’m sure of it. It was the same one from the library.” She paused, turning around. “Who is she?”

“An enemy,” the Dean said firmly. “An insolent child who cannot be allowed to undo the great work we have prepared.” She walked forward, allowing just a bit of maternal affection to slip through as she cupped the face of the vampire that had once been Danny Lawrence, leader of the Summer Society and all-around irritant, in her hand. “You don’t need to trouble yourself with such things, my dear. There is us, our family, and there is everyone else.” She sighed, “You don’t want to disappoint Mother now, do you?”

“Of course not,” she replied, but went right back to staring at the entrance. “Should I go after them?”

Under other circumstances, the Dean might have just sent her along, but this…regression was troubling. With so few reliable and _loyal_ beings around, it was too risky to leave to chance. She _will_ have to deal with this, but it would hardly be the first time. Strong emotional connections, even _love_ , she thought scornfully, could survive the process of resurrection every once in a while. Which was a pity, really, because these types of vampiric thralls were _supposed_ to be easier to control than a vampire made by more conventional means. Or at least before the body has had any chance to begin to decay. A few hours could make all the difference.

“No,” she said, “you will come with me. I have to meet with the new Board, and I rather like having an insurance policy about. This body,” she eyed herself critically, “is rather weak.”

Not for the first time, she wondered about just taking the one in front of her as a new host. Tall, athletic, good hand-eye coordination...perhaps if she had been resurrected sooner. Besides, the representatives of the Corporation seemed to have _finally_ accepted her new form, and it would have been a pain to acclimate them all over again.

No, for now, she would leave things _exactly_ as they were.

_And when Mircalla and that brat show their faces again, I will be ready for them. And hers will be the last face that insolent whelp of Mircalla's ever sees._

Irony  _was_ delicious, she'd always thought.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey look, I did update relatively quickly. And I have chapter 4 plotted out, so this is a good sign.
> 
> I'm having to make up my own rules of vampirism, as the show is not terribly forthcoming in that regard, but I think a distinction can be made between whatever Carmilla (and Mattie) went through and what was done to Danny. So I'll at least try to be consistent with my own lore, in a way that basically fits what we have seen on screen and the narrative demands of the story. 
> 
> I realize LaFontaine hasn't had much to do, and Carmilla is basically functioning as an exposition machine (and occasional badass) and I will seek to address that. I may have my own shipping preferences, but Carmilla and Laura's relationship is still an intensely interesting one. 
> 
> I couldn't kill Kirsch. I suspect the show will, as there should probably be -some- mortal consequences for last season, but Kirsch's 'being in the friendzone is awesome!' speech is one of the greatest things I've ever seen in any media and made me kind of adore the idiot. So he gets to live, albeit barely. 
> 
> I know the Dean addresses "Laura's audience" at the end, but that...doesn't make a huge degree of sense to me unless it's just breaking the fourth wall. If nothing else then because I don't think she would reveal her new host to the entire student body before things had been better cleared up. So I'm working on the assumption that Laura and co will be the first ones to actually see what happened (minus Mattie). That will be fun. 
> 
> The last section is in the past tense as the Dean is most definitely someone who thinks about what has and will happen, versus what is happening.


End file.
